[19] The wise Goethe once said to Eckermann: “The poet, as a man and citizen, will love his native land; but the native land of his poetic powers and poetic action is the good, noble and beautiful, which is confined to no particular province or country, and which he seizes upon and forms wherever he finds it. Therein is he like the eagle, who hovers with free gaze over whole countries, and to whom it is of no consequence whether the hare on which he pounces is running in Prussia or in Saxony.… And then, what is meant by love of one’s country? What is meant by patriotic deeds? If the poet has employed a life in battling with pernicious prejudice, in setting aside narrow views, in enlightening the minds, purifying the tastes, ennobling the feelings and thoughts of his countrymen, what better could he have done? how could he have acted more patriotically?” [20] New York, 1917. P. X. [21] Op. cit. P. 48. [22] Julio Cejador y Frauca. _Historia de la Lengua y Literatura Castellana_, Madrid, 1915 to the present. [23] In their _Compendio de Historia da Literatura Brasileira_ (1909, Rio, 2a edição refundida) Sylvio Romero and João Ribeiro point out the existence of a certain Germanism from 1870 to 1889, due chiefly to the constant labours of Tobias Barreto. Italian influence is very strong in law, and that of the United States in political organization. As will be seen in a later chapter, the United States had, through Cooper, a share in the “Indianism” of the Brazilian Romanticists. Our Longfellow, Hawthorne, Whitman and Poe are well known, the latter pair through French rather than the original channels. [24] Rio. Second edition, Revised [25] This by no means implies acceptance of Romero’s critical standards. See, for details, the Selective Bibliography at the back of the book. CHAPTER II PERIOD OF FORMATION (1500-1750) The Popular Muse--Sixteenth Century Beginnings--Jesuit Influence--Seventeenth Century Nativism--The “Bahian” school--Gregorio de Mattos Guerra--First Half of Eighteenth Century--The Academies--Rocha Pitta--Antonio José da Silva. I